It is useful to collect biological surface cells from internal lumens of the body. Such cells are useful for diagnostic procedures including the identification of predictive biomarkers that allow clinicians to predict future prognosis for a patient. In such diagnostic procedures, it is important that a large numbers of cells are collected from an area of interest while minimizing the collection of foreign cells in order to obtain an accurate diagnostic result. Ideally, the collection of the surface cells would occur with no damage to the body lumen.
A current method of collecting surface cells is to use a cytology brush. The cytology brush has stiff bristles that extend radially outward from an axis of the cytology brush, and in some examples the stiff bristles have hooks to retain cell samples. The cytology brush is delivered to the area of interest and then brushed against a surface of the body lumen, abrading cells from the surface and catching the cells within the bristles. The use of the cytology brush may result in bleeding where the lumen surface is abraded and is inefficient in its collection of surface cells. Accordingly, it would be useful to have an alternative to a cytology brush for the collection of surface cells in a body lumen.